Where to begin… A good place to start would probably be with a look back at the previous comic-book heroes to grace the screen. We’ve got the first one to successfully make the leap, and he did it in a single bound, Superman. Then there were many wannabes and copycats, until ten years later a new vision named Tim Burton stayed true to the dark stylistic comic books of Batman. It became one of the top grossing films of all time (when it was released). Then comic book movies hit the downhill slope that wouldn’t level out until almost ten years later, when a hero that wasn’t even half as big as the previous two came to the screen and became a hit. That hero was Blade, and with a star like Wesley Snipes behind it, he became a household name. And so Marvel Comics finally comes to the screen with a well-done film. They would follow with the big-screen version of one of it’s more popular stories, The X-Men, which was a huge success for comic fans and movie fans alike. Then came Spider-Man, which was not only one of the Top 5 largest grossing films of all time, but reinvented the way people thought about comic book films. It made them accessible to anyone; not just comic fans, not just action movie fans, and not just kids and teenagers. Every single stereotype that comic books have hit, and every roadblock that they couldn’t seem to go around were suddenly smashed by a Pumpkin Bomb and blown all to hell.
And so we reach Daredevil, the latest comic hero to make the jump, and following up Spider-Man could prove to give the film more bad press than good. So what do you do when you have a film with a character who lives in New York (just like Spidey), who wears a red costume (sort of like Spidey), and who flies through the building of the city in search of some of the same bad guys that Spidey fights. How do you portray this as something different than Spider-Man to those unfamiliar with the comics?
Director Mark Steven Johnson couldn’t have made this any more different than the webcrawler. It’s dark, it’s stylish, and above all it’s different from anything we’ve seen before. The shots in this film were nothing short of amazing. I’m not talking about “oh, that was pretty cool,” I mean “Wow, this is Oscar worthy.” The only films with as many single shots as amazing as this that I can think of to compare it to is American Beauty. Don’t believe me, huh? Yeah, we’ll talk more after you’ve seen Daredevil. Even if you hate the movie, you’ll be astounded and left speechless by the cinematography.
Okay, next, I’ve got to cover the story. I happened to see this with a friend, Tom, who’s the biggest Daredevil fan I’ve ever seen. He knows everything about DD, and so his opinion is very valuable. The story of the film is sometimes word-for-word, shot-by-shot like the storylines of the comics. With the exception of the way a few characters play out in the film, this is JUST like the comics. The characters are very interesting and well developed, even the smaller roles, and this is the first comic book movie I’ve seen (with the exception of The Crow) where the story doesn’t move in chronological order. It uses an age-old story mechanism called “flashback,” and not in quick little spurts like most films today do. No, you open at a dramatic point, and go back to explain how you get to that point. A great way to tell a story, and creates right at the beginning a certain tone for the rest of the film. This film may have a red costumed hero who gets a lot of air-time, but this movie actually reminds me more of Batman. It’s REALLY dark, very gothic (not this teeny-bopper I want to rebel against my suburban parents by listening to Marilyn Manson goth-stuff, no real gothic style). There’s a lot of religious symbolism (he is called Dare DEVIL) and that adds more of an adult feel to the film. This is not a kids movie. This is not Spider-Man, which is a film the whole family can enjoy. The tones, the storyline, everything, are aimed at people who will understand it, and I don’t think most kids will understand what the characters are going through. The basic story of this, if you don’t know, is a kid, Matt Murdoch, gets blinded as a child but gains extraordinarily enhanced versions of the remaining 4 senses. In fact, his senses are so good that he can see using a “radar-sense.” He lives with his down-and-out ex-boxer father, and when his father is killed he vows to hunt down the murderer. This very basic rundown of the story is about as close to “seen it” as you’re gonna get.
The actors are terrific, and anyone that says that Ben Affleck shouldn’t be Daredevil… just go see it. He is Daredevil. Okay, to prove this, I’m gonna go back to another comic hero that came to the screen and the actor cast didn’t seem to fit. He was a comedian, not an action star. He was too short, he wasn’t bulky enough, and his attitude just didn’t fit the character. He is Michael Keaton, and after his portrayal of Batman, no one else (including Val Kilmer and George Clooney) have been able to pull it off, because they weren’t as good as the guy who didn’t even fit the part. My point is, Affleck was the title character, and he pulled it off with flying colors. He was great in this role, and I wish people would cut him some slack. Jennifer Garner’s first major movie role is the femme fatale Elektra, and she is amazing. As beautiful as she is lethal, NO ONE could have played this part better. She is to Elektra what Hugh Jackman is to Wolverine, and she is, I think, the best thing about the movie. Her character is so well written, and in no scene was she ever just a girl on the sidelines, watching the men. She took control of scenes the way Samuel L. Jackson does, by being in them. That’s all she has to do. With that said, I’d like to point out that Colin Farrell steals this movie. His part is relatively small, and his character is really not in it that much, but he is one of the coolest villains I’ve seen since Nicholson’s Joker. He’s just… really really cool, and Farrell’s a great actor, too. Michael Clarke Duncan is one of the most imposing men ever, and so his Kingpin is what it needed to be. His part is also small, but his threat is there, and it’s as real as it could ever be. When you get to see him fight (and you do) it’s one of those moments where you sit up and prepare to see something really cool. To round out the smaller roles, there’s Jon Favreau who’s just hilarious as Murdoch’s best friend Foggy, and Joe Pantoliano as newspaper (in the comics it was the Daily Bugle, but Columbia Pictures’ Spidey own the rights to that) reporter Ben Urich, who’s great as usual.
Overall, the direction and look of this film is what I remember most. The way the fight scenes looked (like Blade Runner meets Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) was so integral to the story and the way Murdoch’s senses worked. Every single thing this movie needed to nail in order to live up to the Marvel string of hits, to separate itself from Spider-Man, and to not disappoint fans of the character and the comics. These are 3 very different and equally challenging bars raised by the world that this film had to leap over, and somehow it did. And I’m pretty sure the man to thank for that is director Johnson, who even impressed comic book guru Kevin Smith with his knowledge of DD. Between Bryan Singer’s X-Men, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man, and now Mark Steven Johnson’s Daredevil, comic books are proving to not only be hot Hollywood properties, but films that are finally being appreciated outside the fan base of the comics. This is a great action film, but with as many love scenes and intensely dramatic scenes as there are fights. It’s beautifully directed, superbly acted, and above all, it stays true to its source.
---Garth Simmons.
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